


scio

by caes



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Metaphors, Purple Prose
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-25
Updated: 2014-03-25
Packaged: 2018-01-16 22:41:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 737
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1364401
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/caes/pseuds/caes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He dons the wings of freedom and goes to war.<br/>+<br/>He doesn’t know why.<br/></p>
            </blockquote>





	scio

**Author's Note:**

> In which I think about Armin too much. I made a couple big changes at the last minute, so it's a little off.

+

He dons the wings of freedom and goes to war.

+

The time between is different. It passes slowly, like watching grains of sand in an hourglass and drops of water from a broken faucet, full of groundless fear and bittersweet anticipation. But Armin waits. He learns.

( _the price of blood; the price of mistakes; the meaning of choice; comforting words; tales of ancient days and fading memories; conviction; charades; the art of pretending not to know; the art of pretending to know; watching; understanding; power, how to mourn; ways to kill—monsters and other things; heroics; freedom; restraint; lies and half-truths; the understanding of gray and darker shades; hope_ )

Armin learns, observes, dreams, but he’s not sure where he’s waiting for.

+

Between is such a strange word, he thinks. It... _hovers_.

+

He draws out battle plans, hands and rough graphite and trails of thick ink spreading over maps like flowing water, the musky smell that clogs his throat and waters his eyes, moving toy soldiers across the playing board as he commands armies. He no longer thinks of the people, the individuals who are so small and insignificant in the great and grand and inglorious scheme of things, barely more than autumn leaves that will blow away in a symphony if dry rustling. Armin’s hands are stained with ink, hardened by the edges of paper ( _a million paper cuts and more_ ). He adds numbers in his mind ( _binary, fibonacci, infinity_ ). At night he looks at the vast wings of the sky and he counts in his head: distance and men, stars and death and the frightfully low odds.

+

He tends to his wounds. The paper cuts and scratches and the empty things that eat at him. The bandages are clean and airy and white, soft as feathers. How clouds must feel, he thinks. He takes endless yards of the bindings and wraps, repeating loops and twists over and over, pulls them tightly as he bites his tongue against the flood of pain ( _pain is inconsequential; pain is temporary; pain is the least of his worries_ ), until he is satisfied with his work. He tucks in the trailing ends neatly and wears his armor of dovefeather linen. The badge of red shines bright against it. When the ribbons grow limp and soiled he discards them, lets them fly away. And there is always something more to be tainted.

He's not sure when he stopped counting, but he can't remember the first as anything more than shadow and shock, and the betweens have all faded away, and the last is fresh but it doesn't matter if he doesn't acknowledge it; he's adapted and when it all comes down to it, it's just blood, and adaptation is just a fancy way of saying he lost. Blood to blood to blood.

Blood. Blood is a fickle thing. Blood is quiet. Blood is explosive. Blood is a wave, a tsunami and an ebbing flow. Blood sits on his skin, beneath his skin, in his skin, ~~is his skin~~  and boils his marrow and **burns** , evaporates and dissolves in mere seconds. Blood does not leave.

That is the nature of memories.

( _and there are lacerations he cannot heal himself, marks on his heart and breath and something deeper, something achingly parasitic in his mind that leaves ugly, messy scars all over, scars that spread like cracks, shredding, lines and flaws over lines and flaws webbing and creaking and snaking through his brittle bones and bloody soul with every move he makes and he’s ready to shatter like an antique doll, porcelain crumbling to fine dust, useless, abandoned, all just fancy words for broken_ )

+

( _he thinks he is walking in that place, between life and death. walking, or maybe just waiting. he is watching as someone ~~judgement~~  is approaching and he ~~is guilty~~ does nothing, and he wonders if it's because he knows something he's not fully aware of or if it's just because he doesn't care _)__

__+_ _

And there is a toy soldier tucked in his pocket; a scrap of paper and words pressed to his heart; there is ink on his skin; there blood in his veins; there is a forbidden book; a shard of broken ceramic; secrets and oaths and promises on his lips; wings on his back And the wind through it all. Armin remembers what he cannot carry—treasures what he can. He goes to war.

He doesn’t know why.

+


End file.
